Friday, June 10, 2016

Leonardtown Legend and FreeDance/FloorPlay Woodstock

On our morning walk, River and I were disturbed to see that there had been a crime committed on the property. The police were investigating. We stayed clear.

I was excited to hit the road today because I had seen a story on The Weather Channel about a witch named Moll Dyer. She was chased into the forest by the people of Leonardtown because they believed she was responsible for the string of terrible weather they'd had. She escaped them but was killed by exposure to the inclement weather. Her body was discovered days later, face down, with her hand on a big rock. To this day, her hand print can be seen on the infamous rock.

Leonardtown, MD was only a little bit out of the way on my trip today from Richmond, VA to Baltimore, MD. So I set off to explore the little town. I set my navigation to take me to Moll Dyer Rd.

US-301, MD-234, MD-5, I-97, I-895, I-695, MD-45

On the way, I crossed over the Potomac River.
When I pulled onto Moll Dyer Rd. I was saddened to see that all of the forest was private property.

I had hoped to stop and have my lunch in the presence of the witch's spirit, but I couldn't. I drove as far as I could on that road before a sign said not to go further. As I was backing up, there was a truck behind me, so I backed off to the side to let him pass. But he stopped and asked me if I was lost. I answered, "No, I was looking for the haunted forest." He lit up and proceeded to tell me that I was in the right place and told me the whole story, including where to find the rock. He pointed out that a river passes parallel to the road and that's the river she crossed to enter this forest of her final rest. I asked if I could access the river but he said I couldn't as it was all on private property. But the rock was moved to near the old jailhouse, next to the courthouse in town.
So we drove into town and I ate my lunch on the grass outside the courthouse. We found the rock.
At one point I noticed that River's left ear flap was folded back. He usually notices this kind of thing and will shake his head to correct it, but he was leaving it that way. I wonder if the wind felt good on his itchy ear?
My plan was then to go to the motel room in Edgewood and get ready for class in Cockeysville. According to my navigation I had plenty of time to do that. But my navigation didn't count on it being rush hour on Friday. Nor did it count on the extra traffic due to an Orioles game. So as I passed through Baltimore, past the stadium, traffic was nearly halted. It added two hours to my commute, giving me just about enough time to get to the motel and take a quick shower and head back out to the studio for class.

The clerk that checked me in at Motel 6 was grumpy. She was having a fight with her husband(?) when I walked in. She said to him, "I have a customer, I can't deal with you right now." During our transaction, he left. He was an older man with a protruding belly and obviously pained legs. His walk was quite hitchy, and that's the kind of thing that sends River into fits. I could see that he was looking at the man and showing growing concern, but before I could intercept, the woman encouraged River by saying, "bite him!" about the man. That was all River needed to erupt at him. Fortunately, they both got a kick out of how he responded to her request. He didn't bite him, but he barked furiously. They both chortled as I struggled to calm down my beast.

I got to class with plenty of time to spare. I fed River on the grass outside and then loaded in. We did an extended Woodstock Experience class with extra FloorPlay. It was fun. I got the feeling this group was not used to having so much freedom. They really wanted to be led every step of the way, but I kept at the FreeDance focus and they were eventually won over.

PICTURES AND MAYBE VIDEO WILL BE POSTED HERE EVENTUALLY

One woman left for a while during the class but she came back. During most of the class, she looked very self conscious and was doing a very basic rocking back and forth motion. She mostly had a smile on her face, but confessed to me afterward that she really felt bad about leaving. I said not to worry about it. She explained that the work we were doing was hard for her, but she appreciated the lessons she learned about herself. She left momentarily to regroup and wanted to reassure me that it wasn't personal. I told her she did the right thing. She said she learned that she has a lot of work to do on not being introverted and I told her not to be hard on herself. I said there's nothing wrong with being an introvert and that what she was doing was perfect. She liked hearing that and had tears in her eyes as she thanked me again.

Another woman in class today was present at the original Woodstock. And she even still had her ticket. It was in a plastic cover tied around her neck. The date said August 13, 1969 and the ticket price was $7. She also had some Food for Love tickets.

I threw in about 15 minutes of FloorPlay at the end, based on what I learned from the latest release of Debbie Rosas before the glue destroyed my disc.